


Traveller of Cosmos

by Sinlaen



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Astronauts, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Cosmonauts, Dimension Travel, Dubious Science, Eventual Romance, F/M, Mugiwara no Ichimi | Straw Hat Pirates, Mugiwara no Ichimi | Straw Hat Pirates As Family, Nuns, One Piece Universe, Parallel Universes, Post-Time Skip, Pre-Canon, Pre-Time Skip, Pseudoscience, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Slice of Life, Soviet Union
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:55:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24726370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sinlaen/pseuds/Sinlaen
Summary: Soviet Union Cosmonaut Maria Ivanova was returning To Earth from Mir space station in 1988, with the crew of her fellow country men, when her other crew mates dissappeared while Soyuz was burning through atmosphere.She landed safely on water, but unknowns to her, she had ended up in Alternate Universe, to the World of One Piece.After trying to contact Moscow in vain Maria found her way to the safety of a nunnery, where she spend her time, untill a newly formed group of Pirates called Strawhats ended up docking on the Island.And so started the tale of how USSR Cosmonaut became part of the Strawhat crew, forever changing the live she should have had.ON HIATUS also deleted 5th chapter, since I was not satisfied with it, I will propably pre plan what happened in it and change things around, but I will not be writing this for a while yet.
Relationships: Franky/Nico Robin, Mugiwara Kaizoku | Strawhat Pirates & Original Female Character(s), Roronoa Zoro/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 20





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I tried my best with looking up on info about Soviet era Cosmonauts and how things worked for them, but things might not be perfect, still tried my best. Might also have some odd science or something not fitting our time line, as it's little Au of our world as well, because of her crew not truly existing.
> 
> Also personally I'm not really that religious so there might be some misunderstanding with that as well, but I also looked things up and used my best knowledge on things.
> 
> Edit: Betaed by none native English speaker, so might still have errors.

In 1988 a crew of Cosmonauts had just finished their time on the Mir space station, after spending 257 days on orbit. The Soyuz-TM they were sitting in had just entered the atmosphere and started its re-entry.

“It will be nice to be at home, after our long stay on Mir”, Commander of their mission, Vladimir Lebedev stated to his fellow crew members Boris Kuznetsov and Maria Ivanova, during the brief communications black out, that all spacecraft’s re-entering the Earth, are affected by.

Boris on his left was the first to answer “True can’t wait to be with my family once more.”

“Though soon we will miss Mir as well” Maria, the final crew member commented.

“Can’t deny that Marivanna”, Vladimir used the nickname, the crew had for Maria; it was common nickname for Maria Ivanovna’s, though her family used Masha instead.

This had been her first space flight, after training for years to be a Cosmonaut, she had been able to travel to the Mir space station, where they had conducted different kinds of experiments and taken care of the station, making sure that everything was running fine.

She herself was an biologist, and her studies had focused more on the affects the space had on human bodies on long term, even though they had done similar tests before, she continued from the old knowledge and had some new things to use in test, that they never had done in orbit before. The knowledge she had gathered was used back on Earth, by men and women much smarter than her, to make other new discoveries, that were possible because of the work she had done in space.

“Be ready now” Commander said, as the g-forces started to be felt on their chests, it wasn’t uncomfortable by any means, just made breathing take little more effort.

The moment was quite quick and after a while their parachutes opened and they started slowing down in preparation for landing.

Soyuz hit the water as they landed, it was a splashdown, which wasn’t what their landing was supposed to be, but they still were prepared for it, just in case.

Maria could see the waves hit the windows as she looked out of them, it didn’t seem to be too rough of a weather, only wind hitting their Soyuz sides, as it was otherwise a bright day.

Turning to her left from the window, to look at the two other members of her crew, it was eerily quiet. “Commander? Boris?” she let out, both being completely still in their place on the Soyuz.

As she heard nothing from either of the two, her hands went to the straps that held her to her seat during re-entry and opened them. Getting them open she moved to her left, getting closer to the two others, lifting her hand up to their helmets and peeking inside of them.

Becoming shocked from what she could see, she backed away a little. Both of the suits where empty, nothing was inside, even though just moments ago she had had a talk with her Commander.

Reaching for the radio as she settled down on her place once more she tried contacting the control centre in Moscow. “Moscow this is cosmonaut Maria Ivanova from the Soyuz-TM shuttle that has just landed from its mission on space station Mir” she managed to stay calm even though her two crewmates had disappeared into thin air, mostly from the training she has had as cosmonaut, where they need to try stay calm in most desperate situations, so they could survive.

To add insult to injury she heard nothing back, only static sound came through her radio. She repeated her message few more times, even trying to contact NASA, but nothing was heard through that frequency either.

Believing that she must have a broken radio, she turned around in her spot to reach for their survival kits, that where behind their seating, as inside these kits there would be a portable radios that, if their Soyuz radio was broken, they should be able to use to contact Moscow.

Finding her kit and opening it, she took the radio out of it, and called Moscow once more. “Moscow, this is Maria Ivanova of Soyuz-TM, returning from Mir, waiting for extraction, over” her voice wasn’t as calm anymore as it was before, though she was still firm and clear on her words.

Once more nothing came through, only static could be heard through the radio waves.

It took everything Maria had to not become panicked. “Stay calm, they should be on their way here even if it will take some time” She breathed in deep to try calm her beating heart and after a while made her decision, she would need to leave the shuttle and get outside, as Soyuz itself wasn’t really meant for long stays after it had landed, as it was cramped inside.

She looked outside the window to see if she was reasonable close to an island, she would need to swim few hundred meters, but they had cold water survival suits and buoyancy devices with them for just these situations.

Gathering the survival kit all cosmonauts where given and setting it in front of her, she started getting out of her Sokol space suit, that she had been inside of, during the landing. The Sokol could be used in water as they were water-proof, but it would be too cumbersome to move on land in it, after just returning from micro-gravity and her muscles being atrophied from the trip.

She wasn’t that strong right now, but she managed to struggle her way out of the Sokol, and was now opening the survival kit she had in front of her. From within it, she took out her orange waterproof suit and put it on.

“Hopefully this is as good as they said it is” she said as she was getting inside the suit, she had to squeeze and twist herself to get it on but at last she succeeded in it. She also took out the buoyancy device and some of her other personal items along with the survival kit, putting them inside the waterproof bag that they had on board.

She went to the hatch and opened it, and then she pushed herself through the hatch, with the kit within the waterproof bag with her, closing the hatch behind her and carefully lowering herself down to the water, when she was completely in it, she started swimming towards the island close by. It had small rocky beach on the side closest to her, which she intended to land on. Rest of the island was relatively flat and had pines and spruces growing on it, she got the feeling that it was somewhere in Northern hemisphere, because of the familiar greenery of the island, though she wasn’t sure, if it was in Europe or America.

The swimming took a while, as she wasn’t used to the gravity, though it helped that she was in water and not on land as the water’s buoyancy helped a lot with her trek. But soon she reached her intended landing spot and she slowly crawled out of the water, so the water wasn’t any help anymore.

Crawling little further inland she turned on her back and took a deep breath from the journey she just had, she was tired and her muscles couldn’t hold her up that well, so she decided that it would be best to lie down for a short while, while she gathers her strength back. To get her fully back in strength would take little longer, but even small break while laying on the rocks would be better than push on while she had none to begin with.

She laid down for few minutes, until she had gotten enough rest and was ready to put on some of the other clothing items she had on her survival kit. Sitting up, she started digging the inside of her kit, which was still next to her in its waterproof bag, to find her woollen gloves as well as her blue knitted cap, which had her name in Cyrillic alphabet and put these on.

It wasn’t super cold, only around 10 degrees Celsius, but staying warm while she was going to be sleeping under the stars was crucial, even with cold proof suit, her head was exposed to elements, even though the suit came with purple mitten shaped gloves, she decided to switch these to the woollen gloves, as her hands where more free to move in them.

This also meant that she had to start her fire soon, as the sun was starting to set on the horizon. Rummaging through her kit once more, her hand found her waterproofed matches as well as her striker, taking them to her hand as she pulled them to her pockets.

Looking around her she saw some broken branches of the pine tree, close by to the rocky beach she was sitting in. She slowly stood up and carefully walked towards them. She still didn’t have her strength back from her trip to space, but felt better from the swim.

Taking the sticks she walked back to her camp site on the beach and made a campfire, piling up the branches on top of one another and struck her matches with the striker, she got fire burning and after blowing into it few times, the fire lit up and started warming her up.

Taking some of the provisions she had in her kit, she ate and drank, before the day’s events started to plague on her mind.

“I’m who knows where, alone, without any way of contacting Moscow…” her thoughts come to a halt. Was something going on that prevented her radio signals from finding their target? Has America attacked them while they were landing, though that wouldn’t explain how her crew mates disappeared into thin air, there just wasn’t any logical explanation that would explain where they had gone. She was at loss; she couldn’t come up with anything that could explain what happened, other than her leaving Mir alone, but even that wasn’t plausible, as she had talked with her crew almost until their landing.

Had she gone crazy?

“Better not think of that. I just have to wait for now, hope for some theory that I can go with.” her eyes rose to the horizon, watching the last rays of sun starting to set. “I should probably get rest and dwell on this more later.” she turned to her kit and retrieved her blanket from within, as well as her Cosmonaut survival pistol, which was standard equipment in their survival kits, this pistol had three barrels, two for shotgun rounds, and one for ak-47 rounds, it also had a machete on its removable stock. “Better safe than sorry” she though, as she could never be sure, if something was to come out of the woods while she slept.

Setling on her side she pulled the blanket over her and laid her head on her hands, using them as a pillow. She closed her eyes and fell asleep.

* * *

Some hours later, as the sun was starting to rise, Maria woke up from her slumber. Her hands had gone little numb while using them as pillow, so she started to shake her hands to get them awake as well after she had risen up.

While getting the prickling feeling out of her hands, she also noticed that her fire had gone out, though she was still pleasantly warm so it must not have been that long ago. After a while she rolled her blanket to put it back in its place after which she started her fire again so she could take care of her food and water situation after which she went to take care of her business little ways away from where her camp was at.

Rest of the morning she spent by the fire, occasionally trying to get signal through her portable radio, though it was fruitless.

She was honestly starting to get worried that she would never be found; when on the horizon she could see ship approaching.

This ship wasn’t what she was used to seeing, as it was a small sailing ship. Deciding this was her chance; she took her pistol, loaded it up with a flare and shot it towards the sky, where it was burning red as it slowly descended back down.

It didn’t take long for her to see that the ship had changed its course, sailing towards the island she was on.

When it got closer the lone man on the deck said to her “That was neat trick you had there.” this man had a neatly styled moustache and wrinkling smile on his face. ”Are you perhaps marooned?” he continued.

“You could say that” she said back as she looked at the ship he was on, it was a wooden sailing boat as she had gathered, but it seemed of a much older design, than what she had though from far. “Do you perhaps have a radio that I could borrow or a way for me to get to Moscow or some other city?”

Though to her surprise the man looked confused as she mentioned both things to him “I’m not sure what this radio is you are talking about, and there is no place called Moscow that I know of”

Baffled from his words she had to be sure she heard right “You are confident that you don’t know of Moscow or of a radio?” perhaps he was living an old fashioned live and simply never had heard of radio, but never having heard of Moscow, that doesn’t seem right.

“As I said, I’m not sure what you are talking about, here in East Blue we don’t have a place called Moscow and no, I don’t know of a thing called radio” he looked at her like she was the odd one out “Though it could always be possible that some other Blue had a place called that, though radio still doesn’t ring a bell”

East Blue, what was this man talking about, she though before answering the mans inquire “Radio lets you talk to others far off.” Explaining the most basic function of the radio, without going into too much depth would probably yield something.

And it did “Oh, you mean Den Den Mushi” he answered with a small laughter “Why didn’t you say so, of course I have one”

“Snail Phone? “ She wondered what he meant by that, in her thoughs. “Am I able to borrow it from you?”

“Step on board; we should probably get you away from this deserted island” he answered in affirmative and got his boat little closer to the rocky beach as she gathered the stuff she had and packed them all in her bag.

Offering his hand to her as she was done and was ready to step on board, she took it and was pulled on board the small vessel.

“Here’s the Den Den I promised to borrow” his hand went to his pocket as he pulled out a huge snail.

“Snail?” Flabbergasted from the sight of a snail on the man’s hand she couldn’t keep her face neutral as a shocked expression appeared on it.

“What else would Den Den Mushi be?” man asked her with a serious voice while raising one of his eyebrows.

Couching a little she lied “Yes of course.” The man handed her the snail as he turned around and walked to the sails.

“Ready to leave this island?”

“Sure let’s go” she answered him, her gaze still on the snail on her hand. This snail had rotary dial on its side and receiver on top. “Just use it like you would a phone” she though while her hand went to lift the receiver “Gacha” the snail just let out that sound from its mouth. Intrigued she continued with choosing the number and calling.

After a moment her call was picked up “Pauline here” to Maria’s surprise the voice really came through the snails mouth, though unfortunately it was a wrong number.

“Oh I’m so sorry, I called wrong number” Maria told the other end of the phone.

“No worries, good bye” Pauline answered and closed the phone, which also made the Snail talk out.

After this she tried few other numbers she knew of, but none of the others answered her.

“No luck then?” man asked her as she had left out a sigh.

“No, cannot connect to anyone.”

“Do you have any other place I could take you, than this Moscow you mentioned?” he asked her while continuing with steering of the ship.

“Where exactly are we, you mentioned something about East Blue” she still wondered about this, it wasn’t a place she had ever heard of.

“Yes East Blue, you know weakest of the seas and what not, not much for you to worry here”

That didn’t tell her much of anything. “I don’t think I have any other places to go to” she told him after a hard though, she wasn’t sure what was going on, but if she were to believe this man, she was in a place she knew nothing about.

“Well I could always take you back to the Monastery that is close by; it’s where I came from. I do some fishing and other things for the nuns there”

“Of what religion?” it wouldn’t be the worst place for her to go to try to understand what was going on, it could also be a good place to wait, for if she could get her radio to work again.

Answer came rather quickly “Christianity, the monastery is the only one in the East Blue, there are many more in the other seas.”

Her family had always been Orthodox, but with the USSR not being as tolerant with religions, they had believed in private, she herself was also a believer, though she hadn’t been as active for a long while.

“Well I have no other places to go, so I might as well come with you”

* * *

And so their journey to the Monastery Island began. She saw odd things along her ways, like what she could only describe as sea monsters that occasionally popped their heads up from the water as they went by them.

Few hours into their journey an honest to God seagull arrived to their ship delivering newspaper, that the man, who she learned was called Isaac, paid for. He offered it for her to read, which made her learn a lot more about this place she was in. Apparently the World was mostly run by World Government, and that Marines were chasing after Pirates. Yes apparently she had ended in the Great Pirate era, where many crews run havoc on civilian, though Isaac also told her that it wasn’t so black and white, that there were some good Pirates as well.

“That’s the Monastery Island” Isaac pointed after 3 day journey from the island she had been on. The Island was a beautiful sight to see, it had stairs carved around the mountain on top of which sat the Monastery. Monastery was a huge grey stone building, almost like a Medieval looking castle. It was beautiful sight to see.

“It’s beautiful, it must be rather old” she was curious about that.

“Ay, to my knowledge it’s at least 400 years old, you should ask the nuns when we arrive, they should know more.”

Soon they arrived at the dock, where they unloaded the few things she had as well as the fishes that he had caught on his trip.

“There is another dock on the other side of the island, but this is the main one we use” Isaac told her as they walked towards the many stairs carved into the mountain that lead up to the Monastery.

She was close to good shape as they climbed the stairs up, the three days it took for them to sail had been enough for her to recover and get used to the gravity once again, though she still hadn’t gained back her weight and muscle mass as of yet.

Arriving to the top, they were welcomed by some nuns who Isaac introduces her to, who ushered her inside to meet the canoness.

“Mother Gisell, we have a new arrival” one of the nuns said to the canoness as they arrived to where she was.

“What’s your name my dear?” Mother Gisell asked while she took Maria’s hands to hers.

“Maria Ivanova”

“And you wish to join our order?” Mother Gisell looked her into the eyes as she asked her of this.

“I’m not sure yet, I’m lost and not sure what is going on” she told the mother, sadness in her eyes.

“Come dear let’s sit and talk what bothers you so” Gisell moved her hand to Maria’s back and guided her towards her desk “Sit my dear”

Maria sat down and was offered tea, which she took few sips of before setting the cup down.

“Now tell me Maria, what are you worried about” Mother Gisell had gone around and sat opposite of her, holding her gaze with Maria as she started to tell Gisell what all had happened in these last few days, all the way from the space station to her crew missing and not being able to contact Moscow to her rescue at the hands of Isaac.

Mother Gisell listened to her tale and asked some questions; together the two of them come to conclusion that this was not the World she was from, that she had somehow ended up in alternate reality.

This new reality had similar things to her old World, like human beings and Christianity; even Cyrillic alphabet existed, though it was not one of the main ones used.

She also learned of the differences, how this World was mostly of oceans, four Blues: South, North, West and the East they were in, as well as Grandline, that run through the entire equator, as well as of the only continent of this new World, Redline that was located around the entire prime meridian.

She was told about the different species of humans that existed, and when she told Mother Gisell that in her World humans where only ones that existed, she was shocked in turn. She also talked about the situation in her reality, how there was a Cold War going on between her country and another super power, how they never truly where in direct conflict, but how there was a constant fear of a war breaking out. She also talked about the work she did as a cosmonaut.

Their long conversation came to a natural end after many hours of talking and before either of them rose from their seats mother Gisell asked “My dear, would you be interested in joining us here?”

She gave it some though, she had nothing here, and she knew of no way to get back she also did believe in God, even though she wasn’t really sure if it would be same, but if both Worlds had same religion, they both must also have same God for that religion, surely?

“I would be honoured to join your community, though I do not know yet how it will work out, I have no other place to go, but here.” Maria gave her answer to Mother Gisell.

Her life as a novice nun in a different World started from this meeting. The religious community was great place to learn things about the World she now lived in, she was also taught to read the letters they mainly used, though spoken languages where much easier, as she learned that this world only had one, they wrote in many different ways, and she would need to learn the different writing systems to understand them, but everyone spoke of the same tongue. She had at first though that everyone was speaking in Russian, but now she had learned that it wasn’t so.

And so she spend many months with the nuns of Monastery Island until almost a year later that would once again all change.

* * *

On the day that Marias Soyuz space craft landed

_“Purururu, Purururu”,_ a black Den Den Mushi was picking up a signal that it soon relayed.

_“Moscow this is cosmonaut Maria Ivanova from the Soyuz-TM shuttle that has just landed from its mission on space station Mir”_

_“I repeat this is cosmonaut Maria Ivanova from the Soyuz-TM shuttle that has just landed from its mission on space station Mir, do you read me?”_

There was a small pause on these signals until it picked up some more

_“NASA, this is Cosmonaut Maria Ivanova who just landed from a mission to Mir, do you hear me?”_

It got quiet once more, the signal going quiet for a minute this time, until it picked up again.

_“Moscow, this is Maria Ivanova of Soyuz-TM, returning from Mir, waiting for extraction, over”_

And then the signal seemed to end, nothing more coming through.

“Relay this to Headquaters, they will want to hear about this” Lieutenant told his Chief Petty Officer who ran to the room next door, where they had their connections to the Marine Headquarters.

He waited for the Den Den Mushi to be picked up “This is Chief Petty Officer Raymond, our black Den Den Mushi picked up interesting signals, I will fax its contents to you” he told the officer on the other end.

Marine Headquaters on the day of the Soyuz landing.

As the fax came through, the Marine Headquarters Captain reads its contents, his brows rising as he asked for confirmation on the content he got.

“Yes, Captain this just came through few minutes ago, and from reports we got and from the contents of what the signal we got said, there was apparently meteor sighting close to the Island of Pinewoods”, the Chief Petty Officers voice came through the den den mushi as he gave his report.

“Thank you Chief Raymond, we will get in touch soon” Captain ended the call as he himself needed to report to his superiors of this situation.

He ran through the halls of the Marineford ending up behind the door as he knocked on it and it was opened for him “Captain Davis reporting of a situation on East Blue that you might be interested in, Fleet Admiral Sengoku.”

Sitting behinf his desk was the Fleet Admiral of the Marines “Report ahead.”

“Ten minutes ago our black denden’s picked up a signal close by the Pinewoods in East Blue” he said as he stepped closer to hand in the call recording that was faxed to them.

Sengoku took look at the fax, reading its contents. “And is what we heard accurate?” he asked.

“To our knowledge, there was a confirmed meteor, or what was presumed to be a meteor, seen by the same islands these signals were most likely coming from”, Captain Davis informed Sengoku.

“We need to send our people to this site, go run to get Momonga here” Sengoku told Davis, who runs to get the Vice Admiral while Sengoku contacted the World Government.

4 Days later

Marine fleet led by Vice Admiral Momonga arrived to the likely site of the signal they had gotten. As they closed in on the island an Ensign spotted something on the water.

“Vice Admiral Momonga, there seems to be something floating in the water” he yelled from the front of the ship while pointing towards the object.

They got closer to it and saw that it was a manmade object. “Lift it up” hearing the order the Marines attached ropes with hooks in the end of them around it and used a winch to lift in on board their battleship.

The Marines followed the instructions found outside of the object to open it. Inside it they saw three suits as well as lot of other things. The suits reminded them of diving suits, but they were also quite different from the ones they were familiar with.

They also could reasonably deduce that it had carried three people within it, and the name tag on one of the suits confirmed that the woman who had made the call was called Maria Ivanova. The other two people inside the shuttle where deduced to be Vladimir Lebedev and Boris Kuznetsov, they were able to find pictures of the two of them and arrange missing person posters that offered a price and said they wanted them alive to know more about this station the female had mentioned, though as the woman’s looks were not known to them in any way, they could only ask her by name.

Later on the Shuttle was thoroughly looked at and given to Dr. Vegapunk for research, he was able to confirm that the shuttle was indeed a space craft and that it had come through the atmosphere before landing in the water.

And thus started the reverse engineering of the things finds inside the shuttle, though their focus was trying to make a ship that could be send to space, but as they only had a part of this ship, it would take them still years to get anywhere, even with the help of Vegapunk.


	2. Starting a new Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As unwanted things happen, Maria's new life begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided on a pairing and will add tag for it as well.

9 Months Later

For 9 Months Maria has been living in the Monastery Island. She has been learning to read some of the different writing systems that are in use in this World, though she could recognise that they also appeared in hers, but wasn’t sure what language used them. As well as more general knowledge, though as they were in East Blue the things she managed to learn where rather lacking.

She wasn’t sure, if everything she learned was true or, if they were legends and myths that this World held. Like these things called Devil Fruits, they were mentioned in some texts, but as she asked about them, none of the sisters had ever seen one, so she wasn’t sure, if those were just an urban legend or something she should keep in mind.

Other than that she spend her time as a novice nun, praying and studying the vowed live as well as living in the novitiate. She had been allowed to wear the habit by her abbes, though she also had to wear the apostolnik, black cloth veil that covers her head, neck and shoulders. She hadn’t had to cut her blond hair yet, as a novice but that would be something she would do when she became rassaphore.

Currently Maria was sitting on her bed in the novitiate, reading on some texts she had been given to study, waiting for breakfast to start. She still had her items that she took from the Soyuz, Mother Gisell had deemed them something that she should keep, at least until she had completed her training and proving, just in case she wasn’t ready to fully commit to their order.

“Maria!” Sister Amelia shouted as she run towards her room.

Maria closed her book and set it on her lap, as Amelia opened the door to her room.

“You need to leave” Amelia said whilst out of breath “the Marines have come looking for you.” she continued.

“How do they know I’m here?” Maria replied as she rose from her bed and started to gather her belongings.

This was something they had talked about few months in to her stay, after Isaac brought back missing person posters of her and of her crew. At first Maria had though that it would be good to check the situation with them and maybe get some answers to why she was here, but Mother Gisell had warned her about what could happen, if she went to the Marines, telling tales of torture and slavery. Maria had been shocked to learn that slavery was still legal in this World, as it hadn’t existed in her home country, since Tsar Alexander II abolished it in 1861, one hundred and one years before her birth.

“They don’t” she was replied to “but they are going to check the register soon and with your name in it, they will know.”

“Do we have much time?” she inquired as she packed everything she had.

“Mother Gisell is trying to buy some time for you, so we should have enough to get you of here.” Amelia told her, helping her with the packing as they both kneeled in the floor to stuff her bag.

“And where will I go?” That was probably the most important question she could have, she couldn’t see herself leaving with Isaac, his ship was in the same port as the Marines were, and she would be spotted and caught before even boarding it.

“Late last night a Pirate ship docked on the western port to re-supply, they seemed like a nice crew, so you are going to leave with them” Amelia informed her as they finished with their packing.

Going with pirates wasn’t something she was sure would be a good thing, she had heard of tales about how cruel they could be and from the tales from her own reality, it didn’t look any better. “Are you sure that’s wise, sending me with these pirates”

“Well we don’t have much of other options either, there aren’t any other ships here, and Isaac is not an option, we just have to trust that God send them so you could get away.”

Hoping that this was the right decision, set by God, she and Amelia left her room and sneaked their way through the Monastery, avoiding the more well-travelled paths to avoid Marines from spotting them.

They reached the western side of the Monastery and stepped through a side door that lead in to the stone stairs that would in turn lead down to the Western dock. The two of them hurried down the stairs towards the waiting Pirate ship which had a fellow sister standing in front of the ship, her back towards them, it seemed that someone had run down to the Pirates to make sure they wouldn’t be leaving without having her on board, while Amelia had gone to get her.

Arriving to the dock, Amelia gripped her by the hand and turned her around for a hug. “Goodbye, I will miss you” tears were starting to fall down her cheeks. “Mother Gisell told me to tell you that you will always be welcomed back, if you need to”

“Goodbye, tell everyone that I will be missing them” Maria also had teary eyes as she gave her goodbye to Amelia; they had become close during the 9 months she had been staying in the Monastery, as they both where novices together for most of Marias stay.

Stepping towards the Pirate ship she looked up to the pirates on board who were looking at her in turn. “You are Maria?” straw hatted teen asked her as she was ready to step abroad.

“That’s me” she told him, which he nodded at helped her get on the deck of the ship, while a man with same colour of green hair as her eyes were, lifted her bag on board for her.

“Alright everyone, let’s go” straw-hatted teen said to the others as they undocked from the pier and sailed off.

Turning towards her, the teen with straw-hat introduced himself “I’m Luffy, man who will become the Pirate King” he had a huge smile that showed his teeth as he said this.

“He must be the Captain then” she thought as at the same time, she had turned her head around to look at the ship, seeing that the mark that was painted on the sail as well as what was on the Pirate flag, a skull with straw-hat, these confirmed her thoughts about the Captaincy of this ship.

“Nice to meet you Luffy, thank you for having me on board” she thanked the smiling Captain.

“Shishishishi, you don’t need to thank me, it was what I wanted to do” Luffy told her in good humour.

“This here is Zoro, our Swordsman” he gestured towards the green haired man that had helped with her bag, he was standing close to the mast, as he had been working with the sails while they undocked.

“I don’t believe in God” Zoro said rather bluntly to her because of her being in her nun outfit, he probably though that she wouldn’t agree with him not believing.

“That doesn’t bother me” she proofed him wrong “I personally believe that everyone is free to believe in what they want” he nodded to her, pleased with her believes on the matter, even if that had meant that he himself though she wouldn’t have agreed.

“This here is Ussop” Luffy pointed to teen who had unnaturally long nose, for her World, but which was only little longer than one of the sisters in the Monastery had “he joined two days ago, just before we arrived at the Island you were on”

“You can call me Captain Usopp” the long nosed boy told her in confident voice, while pointing his thumb towards himself “I have eight thousand underlings ready to…”

“He is not the Captain, he just lies a lot” a red haired woman interrupted the liar. She walked closer to Maria, offering her hand “I’m Nami”

Grasping Namis hand she introduces herself once more “Maria Ivanova, you wouldn’t happen to have any clothes that I could change into?” she herself didn’t have much of any clothing she could change into, as only ones she owned were the ones she had with her in the Soyuz as well as the nun clothing, and wearing the clothes she now had on wouldn’t work, if she wanted to avoid the Marines.

“I should have something that fits you” Nami told her “come to the women’s quarters with me, so we can change you.”

Following Nami as she led her through the deck, to the door on the rear end of the ship, Nami opened the door and entered, as she followed stepping through the door. They entered what she presumed to be a storage room; there were few barrels stacked on top of one another on the left, which were followed by two cannons, one on each side in front of them on the far wall was a door with window.

“The women’s room is down the hatch” Nami said as the two of them walked through the room, Nami opened the hatch for them, and stepped down the stairs to lower level. Maria followed behind her walking down the stairs to a decent sized room. The room had desk next to the stairs they came down from, little further on the same wall was a bookcase, which had only few books in it currently and a cosy sofa was sitting on the furthest wall from them.

“Where do you sleep in?” she asked Nami as she was unable to see any other place to sleep that the sofa.

Nami walked towards the desk and took a rope from the wall behind it, pulling it at the same time causing a hammock to come down from the roof above. “We have two of these in here” Nami pointed to the other rope on the wall “they are surprisingly comfortable to sleep in, boys have five of them in their room, though theirs are always out” she finished.

“No seasickness?” she was curious, she would presumably sleep in the other one for few nights at least.

“Surprisingly I would say they might help a little, but I have never really gotten seasick before, so I’m not sure.” Nami answered her question with a wondering look in her face, it seemed like she had never thought about it before “Though we only got the ship few days ago, when Usopp joined, so I have only been sleeping here for two nights”

So their ship was that new, no wonder it looked like it hadn’t seen much damage from the journey. “So the crew itself is quite new as well?” Maria inquired from Nami.

Nami seemed to think for a moment “Probably only a little over a week, I came on board few days after Luffy and Zoro had met and then we sailed a little before we met Usopp, and now it’s been a week since I got on.”

So the crew was much newer than she would have thought, even with the size of the crew she speculated that they would have been sailing at least 3 weeks, though even then it wasn’t that much older.

“But about the clothes you wanted to switch into” Nami changed the subject after you two had grown quiet after a while. She went towards the back wall of the room, where the closet was and opened it up. “I don’t have many clothes with me at the moment, but we should find something to fit you.”

Nami rummaged through her closet, looking at the different clothes she had in it before turning back towards Maria. “I’m not sure, if I have anything that would suit a nun…”

Maria interrupted her “You don’t need to worry about that, I’m not a nun anymore, whatever you can borrow me, I will gladly take.”

“Would these suffice?” Nami asked as she offered her the dark blue jeans she had on her arms as well as a white t-shirt with blue stripes on it.

Taking the clothes from Nami, Maria looked at them with approval as she responded to Nami “They look great, thank you” Nami smiled back to her.

Changing the clothes, she took her apostolnik off at first before she undressed and folded her clothes neatly in a pile. “I didn’t think you had that long of a hair, I thought that nuns kept their hair short” Nami said while Maria was pulling the jeans on.

“You would be right, but I was only a novice, so it would have happened in my future, when I would have taken my vows.” she responded as she buttoned her jeans close and pulled the t-shirt on, the shirt was little big on the chest, but it still fits rather well on her, without sagging.

“So you hadn’t been in the Monastery for long?” Nami inquired her further.

“Only for around 9 months” she answered back as she walked to her bag, which she searched though, trying to find her brush ”Could I borrow your brush, I must have left it in my night stand while I was packing in a hurry”

“I only have my comb with me, if that would suffice?” Nami told her as she walked towards the desk, from where she took her comb and offered it to Maria.

“Thank you” Maria said as she took it from her hand. Combing through her shoulder length hair that was messy from the headwear she had had on, she asked some questions from Nami in turn. “What’s your job on the crew?”

“Well, I’m only temporarily on board, but I’m a Navigator” Nami informed her, as her face turned gloomy.

“They won’t let you be on board for long?” maybe the males of the crew didn’t want females on board, it was common believe that women brought bad luck on sea.

That seemingly irritated Nami “No it’s not like that, Luffy would love for me to stay”

“So there is another reason for you to leave?” Maria tried to pry further, but as Namis expression started to turn sad, she walked off, returning to where they had come from.

Marias eyes followed Nami’s back as she walked, until she stopped below the stairs. “You can leave your bag down here” Nami said sadly, before she continued up the stairs and disappeared from the view.

Alone in the quarters, Maria set her bag down and pushed it under the table that was in front of the sofa, before she herself also walked up the stairs, back on deck.

As she emerged through the door to the deck, she was met with a sound of splashing water behind her back, turning around towards to where she heard the others talk, she walked up the stairs to the upper deck, where she saw Usopp priming the canon and shooting it towards a reef, which destroyed it.

“Amazing Usopp! That was in one shot!”, Luffy exclaimed loudly to Usopp who quickly recovered from his shock and pointed towards himself with his thumb as he bragged about his skills with weapons. This made Luffy decide, that from that point on, Usopp would be their sharpshooter. Maria wasn’t sure if sharpshooter was a true job on a pirate ship, but decided to not say anything.

“Let’s eat!” Luffy suddenly yelled, as he ran past Maria to the Lounge. Usopp followed fast after him skipping past her as well. Nami looked at them with amused expression before she too followed. Zoro on the other hand stared at Maria for a moment, before he jumped down from where he had been laying above.

“Those fit you better” he exclaimed with a teasing smile as he looked at her new outfit, before continuing his way to where the other were.

Rolling her eyes from his teasing, Maria turned back and walked to the Lounge where the rest were in. As she entered, she could see Nami making snacks with Usopp. “Hey Maria, you don’t happen to know how to cook?” Luffy asked of her, with a hopeful expression.

“I wouldn’t be any better than Nami and Usopp seem to be” she answered him truthfully, as she looked at the two of them cooking. She could make food for herself, but she wasn’t a cook in any measure. “Why are Nami and Usopp the ones doing the cooking?” she wondered why two of the specifically.

It was Nami who answered her “After the first time Luffy burned our food, we haven’t allowed him to cook again, though he does claim he can cook curry, Zoro on the other hand, we never asked” from this Zoro looked Nami from where he was sitting on the table with his hand crossed across his chest, daring her to make him.

“Until Usopp joined I did all the cooking, and now he helps me as well, though you are free to come help us” she stated handing Maria the knife she was holding.

“I haven’t cooked for a while, but I don’t think it’s one of those skills that you would forget about.” Maria said as she started cutting up some vegetables that were on the side.

“So Maria, why did you take off the headgear you had on, Zoro told me it’s something nuns wear” Luffy asked her as he waited for the snack.

“I’m not a nun anymore, I left before I took my vows and I was only a novice” Maria answered Luffy as she put the vegetables from her cutting board to the pan that Nami had on the stove.

“Do you have a place to go then?” Zoro asked from opposite of Luffy.

“Not really, I joined as I had nowhere else to be” she answered them back.

“Do you know what you want to do then?” Luffy asked her, wondering if she had any plans as he stared at her back.

“I haven’t given it much though yet” she answered him back.

Luffy looked thoughtful as they well silent, it lasted until they finished making the food and it was put on the table.

They talked as they ate and Maria got to know the others better, she learned that Usopp truly did lie a lot as Nami had said, though she could also see that he was thoughtful person, trying to make the others feel good with his lies.

Luffy to her seemed like he was always full of energy, though she also had to learn to dodge his wandering hands that tried to steal food from the rest of them, his appetite was endless.

From her previous conversation with Nami she could see that she had sadness in her, one moment she would be laughing with the rest of them the other she would suddenly go quiet, not paying much attention to the rest of them. Maria asked her, if she was okay, as what she witnessed earlier still pressed her mind, but Nami ignored her, and continued eating her food.

Zoro, she learned wasn’t much of a talker, he mostly listened to others, though when he did talk, it was often meaningful and deep. Thought she did learn that he had his own humour as well, which she liked.

* * *

As their dinner was coming to an end and they were getting up from their places, Maria asked them about their cook situation. “Have you given any thought about getting a cook?”

“Do we need one?” Luffy asked her with his head turned to a side, as he thought about it “I was thinking of only adding a musician before leaving for Grandline” he continued.

Feeling like it would be important to inform Luffy about the need for a cook she told him “Especially, if you are going on a long voyage” she began “you can never be sure how long it will be until you get to a new island, and there are many things cook knows to look after” Luffy was about to interrupt her but she pushed on “in sea it’s easy to forgot about nutrients and you also need to make sure that you eat enough vegetables so that…”

Luffy managed to put in “I hate vegetables” he pushed his tongue out as he looked disgusted about the idea having to eat them.

“Which is why you need a cook, they can make veggies taste good, which would guarantee that you would eat them and not get curvy while on the sea.” she finished.

“Is it so bad, to not have one?” Usopp was the one asking her as he had listened what she had to say.

“Lot of people used to die from it, before they realised that you need to eat more balances diets while on board, even now unexperienced sailors suffer from it” of course she wasn’t sure, if that was the situation in this World as well, but she presumed it was highly likely to be so.

Luffy gave it some though before asking her “Where could we find a cook then?”

She gave it some though before remembering what Isaac had told her “While I lived in the Monastery, this fisherman who helped us, told me about this Sea Restaurant…” she gave it some thought but couldn’t remember its name.

“Do you mean Baratie?” Nami asked her after she couldn’t remember its name.

“That’s it, that’s what it was called” Maria answered, happy that Nami knew of it.

“You know where it is Nami?” Zoro followed with his question, as he looked at her close to the door where he had moved before Maria had started her inquiry.

“I have never managed to visited it, but I know where it is as I intended to eat there at least once.” she said back before continuing “I would need to get the map from my room, it has its proximate location” Nami hurried off the Lounge to get her map, so she would be able to set the right course for their visit to Baratie.

They waited for her to get back, before they planned their course and left to do their part in getting the ship to right direction, before long they were on their way towards the Sea Restaurant Baratie.

* * *

As her first night aboard the ship was approaching and she was getting ready to get to her room to sleep on her hammock, she was stopped by Zoro who was leaning on the wall, next to the door she needed to go through.

“How have you liked it so far?” Zoro asked her with a knowing smile on his face.

Turning to look Zoro in the eyes she answered him “It’s been nothing like I imagined” the smile on her face told Zoro what she meant by it, that this whole adventure had been completely different from what she could have expected when she had fled the Monastery this morning.

“I know what you mean” he told her back a smile still on his face “Have a good night’s rest” he pushed himself from the wall and continued to climb the steps that lead to the crow’s nest, where he would be spending most of the night, as it was his turn to be on watch.

Maria walked to the Women’s room where she pulled her hammock down, as Nami had shown her before, she gathered some of her toiletries, before heading to the bathroom, after taking care of those things she climbed on to her hammock and fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I try to avoid canon retelling, though there are some situations that I'm not going to change because I feel they are too important to the the characters, or they happen out side of where Maria is, but then it will be just described (though not always in depht as if it's canon you would already know) and I will tell only of what happened to her (arc goes like canon but she fights someone though trying to avoid these but some arcs are kind of must have), for things that happen like in canon, I will mostly skip over, I believe its no fun to read things if nothing changes from canon or if I wrote only what we already have.
> 
> But you can presume that, if I don't make up something new (which I have intentions to change things up, even if they have same route, as the route is needed to get all Srawhats together), it will go as in canon and I will skip parts of it or fully over it, and tell what happens after if needed, though not always.
> 
> That was kind of long but just wanted to give heads up, and hear what people in general think of changing things, but still not making everything be different.


	3. Sea Restaurant Baratie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Srawhats arrive to Baratie, some fights happen, but also some conversations that change the life of a certain member for better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tbh not sure, if I could have written better, but I hope I got things across well enough.

Next morning Maria woke up from her first night on board the Going Merry, as Nami had said yesterday, the hammock had been confrontable to sleep in. She jumped down from her hammock and started getting ready. Nami was still sleeping on her own hammock, as it was still early.

She got her morning prayer in, before going up on deck, where she spent few hours on reading, before she started on breakfast. Not long after, others had awaken and she was joined by Usopp, as together the two of them finished with the cooking and all of them ate together.

The day continued on after that, they worked on keeping the ship on course and did some other small tasks. Maria was helping around the best she could, she didn’t have experience with sailing, but as a Cosmonaut, she had good general set of skills that could prove useful.

She was pointed towards the crow’s nest; by Luffy who was laying on the ships figure head “You could go up there and help Zoro” Luffy had told her when she had asked for something to do.

“Got it” she answered Luffy, and walked down the stairs from the upper front deck. As she reached the lower deck, she walked towards the mast that had steps, that lead up to the crow’s nest. Climbing up then she soon reached the top and was helped at the end by Zoro who offered his hand for her.

“Have you seen anything?” Maria asked him as they had settled on top, each of them looking at a different direction.

“Other than few small sea kings, nothing much” he told her “there isn’t lot of things to worry about in East Blue, thought from what I know, the Grandline is a different matter.” he continued.

“Is it truly wise to be going to Grandline so soon?” Maria asked with a worried tone, from the tales she had heard and read, Grandline wasn’t a place to go willy-nilly.

“If Luffy wants us to go, we will go. There isn’t really a way to change his mind once he had decided on something” Zoro declared to her, he seemed to be on board with his decision to go. “Though I’m glad that you were able to have him seek out a cook, otherwise our trip there would have been much harder.”

“I just thought it would be best for everyone, if you would have someone on board to take care of your food” Maria expressed her thoughts on the matter, it was true, she didn’t think it would have been good in a long run, if they didn’t get a cook soon.

“You?” Zoro asked. “You don’t think yourself as part of the crew yet, do you?” he turned around to look at her as he said this.

“I’m not sure, if this is a place for me…” she turned around to face him as well “and I’m not sure, if Luffy would want me to join” she looked down as she said this, she wasn’t sure what the feeling she got from her own words was.

It was quiet for a short moment; before Zoro answered her “I think you will soon learn the answer to that” Zoro nodded his head to where Luffy was, and she followed the gesture, Luffy was seen waiving towards the two of them, smile on his face. “He is quite a different from what you would expect from a Pirate Captain and I can promise you that, if anything, he truly cares for his friends” he told her whilst switching his eyes to look at her once more.

They got quiet after that and after a while turned back to their directions continued on with their look-out duty.

That all had gotten Maria thinking, she still wasn’t sure what she would do, she hadn’t known the crew for that long so she wasn’t sure, if this was something she would like to do, or if she was even going to be asked. But as she spent the rest of the day with the crew, talking with them more and getting to know everyone even better, she started to hope that maybe she had found her a place among this young crew of Pirates and hoped that they though the same of her.

* * *

Day later, Baratie could be seen on the horizon. They were all standing on the deck eagerly waiting for the docking; they hadn’t eaten after breakfast, to leave some room for the food from the restaurant and of course they were excited about the possible new crew mate.

Luffy suddenly run to the front of the ship and gripped the railing before walking backwards, whilst his hands stretched. “What the…?” Maria exclaimed before Luffy let go and flew through the roof of the restaurant.

Maria who had frozen with a shocked look on her face as she turned to look at Nami, who was standing to her left, who shrugged her shoulder “He ate Devil Fruit, which made him rubber”

“So Devil Fruits are real?” Maria asked, she had read about them but none of the nuns could confirm, if they truly existed or not.

“They are, even I only learned few days ago, when I saw Luffy and another user.” Nami answered her. “Okay everyone, let’s get ready to dock” Nami told everyone, and all of them went to do their part in the proceedings, for Maria it was to get the rope they would be using to tie their ship up with the Baratie.

As they arrived to the docking point short time later, Maria threw the rope she had on her hand down to the deck of Baratie, where one of their workers tied it up on a post. They descended down on the deck by the ladders, though Zoro just straight up jumped down from the ship, not bothering to use the ladders, with the rest of them. Nami paid small fee for the docking as they walked past the man who had tied their ship, and they entered Baratie.

Inside of the Restaurant was a pleasant looking seating area, they stood by the door for a short while, before they were lead to a free table. They were given some water and given their menus, which they ordered some food from. As their dinner arrived they ate it in peace as they talked. “You wonder what Luffy is doing?” Maria asked the others, they shrugged their shoulders.

“Should propably ask” Zoro stated before getting the attention of their waiter “You haven’t happened to see a Straw hatted teen arrive about half an hour ago?” he asked the waiter.

“Oh, that helper boy who has been causing trouble since he arrived, he was in the kitchen last I saw him.” waiter answered them.

“Helper?” Usopp inquired further.

“Yeah, broke the roof, so now he is working to pay off his debt” waiters answer, caused the rest of them to bursts in to laughter.

“Only Luffy” Nami said after a while, still some laughing could be heard from their group.

“This is usual then?” Maria asked them.

“Usual?” Zoro exclaimed “I would say it’s nothing less than what I expected” and they all laughed once more.

* * *

After some time they could see Luffy enter from the outside, they teased him about being a helper, though he yelled back in anger that they had eaten without him. After some more back and worth teasing on their part, were Luffy almost drowned on water that Zoro tried to force down his throat, a blond man suddenly appeared behind Luffy expressing his love towards Nami who wasn’t very impressed about the display of affection.

“Talking about me, Sanji?” an old man with a long hat and a peg leg asked as he was leaning against a chair.

With a somewhat disgusted expression as Sanji bit on his tobacco harder he answered back “Old man” 

“This is your change to leave and become a pirate” old man told him “You are not needed here anymore”

This exchange made Sanji little confused and also somewhat sad.

The two of them started an argument from it, which lasted for a while, until Sanji was beaten by the old man who turned his back to them and walked away, from their confrontation.

“Good, you were given a permission to join” Luffy started “then you can become our…” he was interrupted by Sanji who completely refused Luffys offer.

Sanji’s mood suddenly changed as he offered free drinks to Nami and Maria “My apology, for the disturbance we caused you” his hand were around Nami as he poured her drink, while explaining everything about it, after some flirting between him and Nami.

He did same to Maria, pouring her a drink; she thanked him, though without flirting on her part. Usopp asked after his drink, but Sanji denied him and they got into argument, that Nami ended with her flirting with Sanji.

It seemed like Nami knew how to get men, who were like Sanji, to do her bidding, as the flirting was possibly the reason the girls got their food for free, though guys still had to pay for their share, which they complained about.

* * *

Two days went by and they were still docked with the Restaurant, as they hadn’t gotten a solution for how Luffy would pay back for the damages he had caused as well as Luffy wanting Sanji to join them, currently Luffy was doing his work, while the rest of them were relaxing on the Lounge on Going Merry.

Maria and Nami where playing a game of cards to pass time, currently Nami was on the lead, as she had won the last round, which had gotten her a significant lead in points. They didn’t bet on anything, put decided the winner would be the one who had more points in the end, which with the card Maria was getting would be Nami.

“Again?” Maria cursed her luck as Nami showed her an extremely good hand that beat hers easily.

“Not everyone can win” Nami winked at her as she gathered the cards, to once more mix them before dealing the cards once more.

The round had just started before a sudden commotion was heard and the crew gathered to the deck of Going Merry, and saw a huge ship sailing towards the Restaurant. Nami was looking through the railings of the lower deck, while Maria was on the stairs up to the upper one where the guys had gathered so they could have a better look at what was going on.

“We are in huge trouble, wouldn’t it be better for us to leave” Usopp panicked to Zoro.

Turning towards Nami, Maria asked “Whose ship is it, for everyone to be so afraid?”

“It’s Don Krieg’s” Nami answered as he held on to the railings, some sweat was falling down her face “he has a huge fleet of ships, though…” she paused.

Maria turned to look at the ship more clearly and was able to see that the sails were completely full of holes, the ship itself also seemed like it had gone through some rough time, as the damage to it was massive.

As the ship got closer to the Restaurant, Usopp and Zoro decided to go inside the Baratie as well, asking them to look after Going Merry. Soon a man from Don Krieg’s ship also entered the Restaurant

After hearing some noises coming from inside the ship Maria asked “Should we go in as well?” turning around she saw Nami looking through the bounty posters that they had gotten the day before from the Restaurant. “Nami?” she continued as she heard no answer.

“What, did you say something?” Nami lifted her eyes from the paper she had been reading and looked at her.

“Just wondering, if we should also enter” Maria repeated to her as she had walked back down to the lower deck and was close to Nami.

“You could go in first” Nami told her, though she seemed to go back to looking at the posters.

Taking them from Nami’s hands, she looked at the one that Nami had been stuck on. “Is this the one that has been worrying you?” she asked as she looked at the Wanted Poster of a Fishman called Arlong.

“What do you mean by worried, nothing has been on…” Nami’s voice had risen as she talked back to Maria, but was interrupted before she could finish.

Sighting, Maria said “Nami, we both know, that I know that somethings been bothering you, at least since the first day we met.”

Nami got little defensive as she yelled at her “There is nothing wrong!”

“You can tell me” Maria started “please let me help you.” she continued pleading that Nami would let her in. They hadn’t known each other for long, but the short time they had been together, they had gotten closer and she could say in good mind that the two of them had become friends.

From her words Nami slumped down on the floor of the deck as she started to cry. Maria quickly followed down after her, putting her hand on Nami’s shoulder, offering support. And so Nami told her about the situation on her Island, how Arlong and his crew had arrived there and were demanding that they paid them so they could stay alive, how her mother had died in order to protect her and hers sister.

They sat on the floor as Maria comforted Nami about the situation. “We should talk to Luffy about this, I’m sure he would help you” Maria told Nami with a gentle voice, after she had calmed down some.

“There is nothing he can do” Nami answered her as more tears started falling from her eyes. “Arlong is a Fishman, and they are far too strong for…”

Interrupting her once more Maria prevented her from continuing “I’m not sure how strong Luffy is, but from what I heard, he is ready to do anything for his friends” Maria had heard Zoro praising Luffy’s will to do anything for his friends, as he had told her about a dog and the shop of his death owner that he had been guarding and how Luffy had helped the dog when it had been burned down.

Before Nami had time to answer her, their conversation was interrupted as a the huge ship of Don Krieg being cut in half, the cut caused the ship to broke down and the parts that well on water made their own ship rock around like they were in a storm.

The crew was seen rushing out of the restaurant as Zoro ran towards their ship yelling at their names “Maria, Nami are you okay!”

Two of them had taken cover when the waves had hit them, it had helped that they both where already sitting on the ground, so neither one of them had flown over board.

“We are fine” Maria answered him, while rising up from the deck, before walking off she helped Nami up and together the two of them walked to the railing as they looked what had happened.

Far off a being could be seen approaching; it was in a small boat that had a cross shaped mast, as the ship got closer some of the crew of the Baratie yelled something about Hawkeyed Mihawk, which no sooner Maria was also able to see the man in question. Man had a hat with a feather on it and a open jacket, he was sitting cross legged and his hands were also crossed on his lap. As he lifted his head up, Maria could see the reason he was called Hawkeye, as his eyes had a gaze like a hawks.

Turning to Nami who was the only person reasonably close to her, without the need to yell she asked “Who is this Hawkeyes?”

The tears where still falling from her eyes from their earlier conversation as she answered “She is one of the Warlords, as well as the Strongest Swordsman in the World.”

Maria turned back to look at the man just as he reflected bullets with his huge sword. So strongest Swordsman, to Maria even being able to reflect bullets was something unheard of in her World, and it got her scared. If something can be done so effortlessly by someone in this World who is called strongest, how strong are the people in here in general, compared to the people in her, would any of her combat training from Airforce be of any use here, or would she just die the first time she was knocked down by someone?

As she had been wondering this Zoro had challenged Mihawk for a fight. And to her surprise it didn’t go well for Zoro, as the fight went on, it become more and more obvious that like he was being toyed with, he was of no match. Her worry from before started to get deeper, if people like Zoro wouldn’t be able to do anything to him, just how big where the difference between people here, was she wrong about having Luffy handle Arlong for Nami, or was Mihawk of even different level from that, class of its own.

Their fight continued and soon Mihawk had shattered two of Zoro’s swords, which lead to the moment that she would never forgot “Wound in the back is a shame for a swordman” she just managed to hear Zoro said to Mihawk, with a proud smile on his face.

“Splendid!” Mihawk answered and to her horror cut Zoro in the chest, causing him to fall down to the water.

“Zoro!” she and Nami yelled from the ship, before Sanji jumped down to the water to rescue him, while Luffy singed himself at Mihawk, who dodged him easily. Some words were exchanged between the two of them that Maria was unable to hear.

Though as Sanji came up from the water and lifted Zoro up on a small boat close by, Mihawk told Zoro to get stronger and that he would wait for him no matter how long it would take, acknowledging the young man as a worthy swordsman to wait for.

And so Mihawk sailed away and Zoro was lifted on board the Going Merry, with the help of Usopp and Nami. Maria asked Nami to go get her bag, as she had a first aid in her survival kit. He also asked Usopp to go get some alcohol, preferably gin or vodka, which he left to get.

Looking at the found she could see that it was deep but not fatal, if she got it under control “You scared me” she told Zoro, whose breathing had deepened somewhat.

“I was prepared to die” he answered her back, opening his eyes as he looked at her face.

“Then, you should be more careful the next time” she answered him.

They had gotten closer in the few days they had been docked to the Baratie, playing games with the crew and having some talks, she had told him how she had become a nun because she had nothing else, though still informing him that it didn’t take away from her believe, he hadn’t asked why she hadn’t had place to go to, believing that she would tell her when she was ready, if she wanted to. Zoro on the other hand hadn’t mentioned much of his live before becoming Pirate, other than that he was a bounty hunter or more like he was named one after turning in bounties because of need for money.

Nami and Usopp returned and so Maria got ready to take care of the wound. Some kind of battle started once more on the other ship, as Usopp moved closer to watch what was going on, while she got help from Nami.

Rummaging through her bag, she took out the survival kit, from within which she found her first aid kit, as was standard for Cosmonauts to have. She took out her curved needle, she had learned how to make stitches just in case something would happen while on board the Mir, and put the thread through it. She poured some alcohol on to a piece of cloth and cleaned her needle, after which she poured some on another piece of cloth and then told Zoro.

“This is going to sting a little” she told him, as she cleaned the wound with alcohol, and she was right as Zoro let out a noise because of it.

After deeming the wound to be as clean as possible she started on the stiches, she was no professional, but she got it done. Nami helped Maria to lift Zoro to sitting position as Maria frapped gauze around his torso. They asked Usopp to help them to get Zoro down to the men’s room, which wasn’t easiest as they had to go down a ladder but they managed and then they brought him to rest on the sofa, as hammock wouldn’t be a good place to rest with the found he had, in Maria’s opinion.

As they had finished with all of their things the fighting outside had ended and they saw Sanji bowing down towards his father figure and yelling “Owner Zeff, I own you hell of a lot, thank you for tolerating me all these years, I will be never forgetting any of it!” tears where falling down his face as he lifted his head from the ground. She could see some more being said, but it wasn’t loud enough for her to hear.

Luffy and Sanji stepped on board and Sanji said his last goodbye, after which the crew undocked and sailed away.

* * *

After things had calmed on board, Maria approached Luffy about the situation with Nami, though Luffy was able to get the first word in “Maria, I heard you helped Zoro” Luffy said to her.

“Yes, I patched him up, he is in the men’s quarters resting” she told him back. Luffy was about to leave and go check on Zoro, before Maria stopped him by taking hold of his hand.

“We need to talk” she told him, as she started to walk towards the storage deck dragging Luffy along, they walked towards the women’s quarters were Nami had disappeared to after they had set sail.

Arriving in front of the hatch that lead down the were hers and Nami’s quarters were, she knocked on it few times, before descending the stairs, still dragging Luffy along. 

“Nami I brought Luffy along so that we could tell about the situation” she said to her as they closed in on where she was standing on the room.

Nami had been crying more down here, as Maria could see fresh track of tears on her face. After a while Nami explained the situation to Luffy, whose face became more serious the more he heard. When Nami had told everything about it, Maria once more comforted her, before Luffy made a decision.

“We will go there, to take care of this problem with Arlong” he said seriously as he places his hat on Namis head and walked up the stairs, out of the room. On deck they could hear Luffy explain the situation, without giving any of the more private details to the crew.

Maria dried Namis tears “Let’s go, we need our Navigator” she told her and for the first time in a while a smile appeared on Nami’s face as she walked up the stairs, Maria following after her.

They set their course to Arlong Bark, with a crew of six, all ready to fight for their friend, Nami crying only tears of joy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of the first things to change from canon, not that big of a change, but I don't think Baraties could be skipped either (Sanji joinin, Zoro's fight with Mihawk), and hopefully I didn't write too much of the canon, as I tried to skip it though still leaving the parts that would be important for other things later on. As you can see we have no Johnny or Yosaku, so things would have to go differently just from that, as in Nami never left because Maria had kept in mind how she had acted in other times. I have some plans for us to meet Johnny and Yosaku soon, so we don't completely ignore them.
> 
> I also tried to start building Maria's relationship with Zoro, and it will become faster soon, I just didn't think it would have made sense for them to get super close (as in relationship, I would say they are friends already as all SH's are) immediately, because of how Zoro is as character, though I have plans for it to start rather sooner than later.


	4. Fishmen and Wounds

Their journey to Arlong Park would take them only a few hours, as Cocoyashi village wasn’t far from where Baratie had been when they left.

Maria had gone back down to Women’s quarters to prepare for the fights ahead, and was currently sitting on the sofa having lifted her bag on the table in the front of it, from within which she took her pistol and both of the ammo types it used as well as a flare, she put them in a small pouch that sat on the side of her hip. She also checked and cleaned her gun, as she last used it nine months ago, when she shot the flare.

Rising from the sofa, she holstered her weapon on her back before she walked towards the desk by the stairs and took a hair tie from one of the drawers which she used to braid her hair, so it wouldn’t get in the way. She couldn’t really change her clothes, as she had nothing else to wear but the jeans she had been wearing since Nami borrowed her clothes.

Deeming herself ready, Maria walked back on the deck, where the rest of the crew were waiting for their arrival to the Arlong Park, most of them already had their weapons by their side at all times so they didn’t have much preparations to do.

“Are we far off?” Maria asked the others as she approached them.

Turning to look at her Sanji answered “Hour at most, misses Maria” the polite way of addressing her was not something Maria was used to, though not at all unpleasant and to Maria it was better than the darling or sweetie she had heard Sanji call Nami, though Nami didn’t mind the endearments used towards her.

“Didn’t know you had a weapon on you” Zoro commented with a raised brow, as he took in the gun strapped on Maria’s back. “Not something I would have expected a nun to have.”

“Oh, I had this with me before that” Maria answered, she hadn’t given it any thought how odd it would seem for nun to have a weapon, and she had yet to have time to talk about her past with the crew, and wouldn’t for a while.

“You were a nun?” Sanji asked, little surprised about it, as he had of course missed that info coming on board after her.

“For less than a year, yes” she told him which Sanji nodded in affirmation.

As she was walking with two of the older males on board, Usopp approached her from behind and inspected the weapon on her back while muttering “I have never seen one like that before”

Maria hearing this took the weapon off from her back and offered it to Usopp “Want to have a look at it?”

Eagerly taking it from her hands, Usopp inspected it, noting the three barrels as well as the machete stock, he asked about the ammo, and Maria gave him one of each, which made him more interested, as they were something he had never seen before. He asked her some more questions and Maria answered him to her best knowledge, but as she wasn’t an expert on guns, there were a lot she couldn’t answer. He also asked, if he could borrow them sometime later to look at them more and to maybe find a way to help her with the ammo situation, as she had mentioned how she currently was limited on it, without a way of getting more.

* * *

Their conversation had lasted for almost an hour, to where they were now able to see Arlong Park close by, she got her gun back from Usopp and strapped it to her back once more, before they gathered to where the others were with Luffy.

“So what’s the plan?” Zoro asked when they were all together.

“Well, I was thinking that we should…” Nami started but to all of their horror, Luffy suddenly flung himself off the ship, straight through the front gate of the Arlong Park that lead to the ocean.

“For fuck’s sake” Nami frustratingly said as they saw Luffy crash through the wall of Arlong Park.

“So what do we do now?” Maria asked little worried, they had lost their element of surprise; as the Arlong Pirates would probably be waiting for backup.

“Well there is not much else to do than dock, now that Luffy already went ahead” Nami told them and they started to guide the ship so it could dock.

They could hear fighting going on as they stepped off the ship so they rushed off to where Luffy was.

Arriving to the scene of battle they saw Luffy fighting Arlong himself, while the rest looked on, though as soon as they arrived the other started to attack them.

Taking the gun off her back, Maria shot at the random crew members of Arlong, while the guys fought with the officers. Thought not soon after Usopp ran off with one of the Officers following after him. Whilst Zoro started a fight with a fishman with six arms and Sanji fought one with a Karate gear on.

Shooting at the fishmen who approached her, or the two others on her sight, whilst being careful not to accidentally hit her friends with a stray pellet, Maria managed to down most of the fishmen who weren’t currently fighting anyone else. Those close by she hit with the shotgun ammo, while those trying to stay out of her range, she hit using the barrel that used assault rifle ammo.

As she finished, she started to watch the other fights going on, while still keeping an eye on anyone else trying to jump in. Maria also saw that villagers had gathered by the gate, after hearing the commotion going on, they stood by the entrance with Nami, who still had Luffy’s straw-hat on her head, and watched the Srawhats as they fought against Arlong and his crew.

She saw how Zoro managed to beat the six armed swordsman and how he was now resting on his knees, his wounds from the fight with Mihawk having re-opened. Though before she could move in to help Zoro, she had to step in on the fight that Sanji had been having with Kuroobi, the Karate fishman, as Sanji jumped in to the water to rescue Luffy, who had been thrown there by Arlong.

Maria started by shooting at him, but Kuroobi managed to dodge and ran to close in the cap. Maria tried to quickly re-load her gun but Kuroobi managed to take hold of her weapon and yank it away from her hands, she was unable to prevent it because of the strength that the fishman had over her.

“Damn it” Maria cursed as her weapon was thrown to the side, now without a weapon she had to defend herself with her sambo skills that she had learned in the Soviet military, which she had been part of so she could become a cosmonaut, more specifically she used to be in the air force.

Kuroobi tried to strike her to the left side of her torso, but Maria managed to avoid the strike by blocking the attack with her right hand while at the same time hitting his stomach with her left one.

Kuroobi grunted as the hit connected, but managed quickly to counter attack by hitting with a strike of his own, Maria wasn’t able to dodge this time, but managed to intercept the strike by blocking it with her left hand, causing her to yell in pain as, on top of their hands hitting one another she also had to take the blunt force of the shock wave that Kuroobis fishman karate generates.

“That hurt” Maria murmured as she looked at her left hand, which was starting to swell from the hit. Though she didn’t have much time before Kuroobi continued his attacks towards her, which Maria managed to dodge by slipping closer to him, she took hold of his arm and threw him on the ground. As Kuroobi hit the ground, Maria went after him, holding him there with all her power. As the two of the wrestled on the ground Maria had to use all her strength to keep him under her as he was hitting the left side of her ribs, trying to get her off of him.

“Let go of me, human” Kuroobi snapped at her, and while the hits to her side where starting to get too much for her, she was able to hold on to him.

“Then stop hitting me” Maria yelled back from the top of him. Their skirmish on the ground only lasted few minutes, before Sanji managed to rescue Luffy from the water and get back in the fray. Sanji run from the side and kicked away the hand that had been hitting on Maria’s left side.

“Maria, switch” Sanji urged and so Maria let go and quickly stepped away from top of Kuroobi, as Sanji took her place in fighting him once more.

After exchanging few words Sanji managed to beat him to pulp, until he was finally able to deliver his final kick that shot Kuroobi through a building. Zoro could be seen smirking at the move Sanji had made ”I guess he didn’t want a dessert” Sanji said after he rose to his full length, exhaustion still clear in his voice.

As they waited for the fight that Luffy had with Arlong to finish, Maria went to pick up her gun before walking closer to where Zoro was and inspected the wound that had re-opened. It didn’t look too severe for Maria, but she needed to re-stitch it and told Zoro so. Her left hand wasn’t doing much better and she suspected it to be broken, her side was tender but she didn’t believe she had broke any of her ribs, though she would need to check it better later.

Soon Usopp also joined them and all of the managed to see how Luffy brought down Arlong Park and liberated the Cocoyashi Village.

* * *

Night was setting as it had been few hours since their fights had ended and after the defeat of Arlong they had also taken care of a group of corrupt Marines.

And as Maria had suspected her left hand was indeed broken and was currently in a cast, she had also been right about Zoros wound but was unable to take care of it herself, so they had let the Villages Doctor to handle it. Doctor had inquired, if they had a doctor on board with the wound being well taken care of and to Luffys disappointment she had denied of being a doctor, saying that she only knew some more basic things.

But currently she was sitting outside and partying with the villagers with Zoro and Sanji, as Luffy had just left to find Nami and Usopp was telling his tall tales to the villagers.

“So Maria, have you given it more though?” Zoro asked her while drinking beer from his mug.

Maria took a swig of her own beer before she answered with a smile.

“I see” Zoro smiled back at her and took another gulp.

Sanji watched the conversation going on between the two on them before he wondered what they were talking about “What is this about?”

“About me joining” Maria told him.

“You weren’t part of the crew yet?” Sanji was surprised by this, as he had though that Maria had joined before him.

“I was not sure what to do before” she explained before continuing “but now I have found my place” the smile that she let out after saying the last word was genuine, she truly felt like this was her place, what she was supposed to be doing. These people who she had only known for a short while had started to become important to her. Guys nodded their head from her words also believing that she belonged with them.

They drank late in to the night, before they retired to their ship to sleep. They had gotten some of Namis mothers tangerines earlier on and you could now see them on the upper most deck, on the roof of the Lounge. Nami had also decided to spend the night with her sister to say her goodbyes.

Maria had gone to her quarters to get her washing supplies before she would go to the shower in their bathroom. As she walked up the stairs, she reached the door of the bathroom at the same time as Zoro did and they both paused in their steps.

“You’re going to wash up as well?” Maria asked Zoro who also carried his towels on his hands.

“Thought it would be quieter now than later” he told her while shrugging his shoulders.

“You should avoid washing while you have the dressing on” she looked down at the wound that was covered by the said dressing.

“I will just take it off” Zoro told her without care and started to undo it, before Maria stopped his hands and pulled them off the dressing.

“No just, here wait for a moment” Maria said as she gave her towel to Zoro before going back down the stairs. In her quarters Maria retrieved some of the smaller towels they had as well as a new dressing before returning to where she left Zoro.

“Here come with me” she said entering the bathroom, Zoro stood outside for a short while before following after her.

“Sit down” she said pointing down towards the toilet as she closed its cover with her foot, as her hands where full.

Zoro sat down on it after setting down the towels to the ground. Maria opened the sink and let the water run for a while, so that it could warm up, before wetting the towel. She put it aside for a while and asked “Could you remove the shirt?”

Zoro looked at her with thoughtful expression before taking his shirt off, as it was removed Maria looked him in the face asking for permission to remove the bandages as well, which Zoro nodded at her.

After removing them she took the small towel that was wrenched in warm water she added soap to it, before she started to clean around the wound, avoiding touching the wound itself. She also examined, if the new stitches were still holding, as Zoro wasn’t the most careful person with his wounds as she had come to learn. She rinsed the soap off the softly used only the water to wash off the soap she had used.

“Use the towel to clean the rest” She told her before stepping away from the room to give him some privacy, where she waited for Zoro to be ready.

“You can come back in” Zoro told her after he had cleaned himself so Maria stepped inside once more.

Once inside they put on a new dressing, Zoro helping her, as she only had her right hand in use.

“Thank you” Zoro told her as they finished.

“No problem” she answered him back while also smiling.

Zoro left afterwards and she was able to take her own bath, while keeping her cast out of the water, she saw that her side was bruising in dark purple colour, she touched it but soon took her hand back away as it was really tender to touch.

Her bath took some time, she managed to wash the grime from the battle away and also shampoo her hair after which she left open once more. Stepping away from it she dried herself off, before going to her room to sleep after changing to her nightgown.

* * *

Morning had come and gone, as Nami had arrived to ship and they had set sail, currently the crew were lying around. Nami was on her lounge chair reading a newspaper when from within it something floated to the deck stealing the attention of the crew.

Together all of them yelled from the shock of seeing Luffy’s wanted Poster.

“30million Berries!” Luffy exclaimed while holding his wanted Poster up, both the real one and the picture had huge smiles on their faces.

“You don’t understand this is a bad thing” Nami said from the floor with depression, not yet ready for them to be wanted.

“But Nami it would happen eventually anyway, for it to happen now and not later is good thing as well” Maria told Nami as she had a hand on her shoulder, trying to make her feel better.

“What do you mean, now everyone is going to come after us, Marines, Pirates, Bounty Hunters” Nami looked at her from the floor.

“Better early so we are prepared for it, than to have a bounty and then not be aware of having it” Maria said helping her up once more.

The boys were all ecstatic, especially Usopp, who pointed out the back of his head that could be seen from behind Luffy.

“Well it’s propably not good to stay on East any longer” Nami said worriedly, which Luffy took as a sign that it was time, the time to go to Grand Line. As the guys celebrated about the upcoming trials of Grand Line, Zoro pointed their attention towards the horizon, were they could see an Island.

“That must then be Logue Town” Nami informed them, as she checked her compass.

“This soon already?” Maria wondered aloud, it hadn’t been many hours since they left Cocoyashi Village. “Do you have the list of things we need that I gave you all?” she asked everyone.

“Yes” was the answer she got from the others, she had run around the ship looking what they would be in the need of, she herself was in need of clothes, as she was still borrowing from Nami, Sanji had also told her that they needed some ingredients. Usopp was given the task of buying all kind of mixed stuff they would need and she had asked him to get her a microscope, as the biologist in her wanted to look how the different Islands differentiated from one another in this World of Oceans and Islands. She had also talked with Nami about allowing them to use the money she had, as they had no other way of getting these things, she had to persuade her little more with allowing Zoro to get new swords without being in too much of a debt, stating that they needed him in his best, when they arrived to Grandline.

They slowly arrived to the dock of the Island, guys went to their own ways, to try and find the things they were tasked with, though Luffy was left to freely roam, mostly because he was already off before they had even properly docked. Maria and Nami on the other hand stuck together as they went to find some clothes for themselves, as well as the guys, as none of them had much to change into either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had some trouble with the fighting scene, as I have never written one, and as you can once more see I skipped stuff over as they basically happened like in canon, so no need to re-write them.. 
> 
> There was lot of things I though to write at first, but they didn't work out in the end because of other things I wanted to happen.. The scene in bath was completely random though I got and I think it is good for the development of Zoros and Marias relationship, it wasn't something I had in mind before the scene itself, so hopefully it is good?

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed please leave comment, would love to know what you all think of this, it's my first One Piece fanfiction and it's been many years since I properly wrote anything so I hope I did well..  
> English also isn't my first language but I hope I still wrote well enough.  
> Feedback is welcome.


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